Social Capital, Individualism-Collectivism, and Subjective Well-being : Evidence from the ISSP

This study examines the associations between three types of social capital (network size, social participation, and general trust) and subjective well-being (life satisfaction). Data were derived from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) 2017 cross-sectional surveys. A total of 33,799 individuals clustered from 29 countries were analyzed. Based on multilevel modeling, this study identifies that social capital positively predicts life satisfaction at the individual level. Additionally, individualism-collectivism is negatively related to life satisfaction at the country level. Furthermore, the effect of network size on life satisfaction depends on the degree of individualism-collectivism in each country. However, the effects of other social capital, social participation and general trust, on life satisfaction were not affected by the degree of individualism-collectivism at the country level. These research results suggest that among social capital, only network size has a relationship with subjective well-being that varies depending on social psychological factors. This study provides implications for the role of social capital among social determinants of life satisfaction and socio-psychological characteristics.